Three days from home the Up/Down switch on our power jack went to smoke. And, it also burnt out the 30A inline fuse. Well, that's a fine fix! First, I thought I'd tackle finding the fuse, so I could bypass the switch. Nope. Went to RadioShack, car parts etc. No 30A Type 3AG fuses. "Honey, cut me a piece of tin foil, please - 2" square."

Wrapped the blown fuse in tin foil and that seemed to work. Then I had to take the cover off the jack control, remove the switch, get two screwdrivers and hold one each across the DOWN contacts. Voila. That worked. The UP contacts were still ok.

I don't carry tons of tools, but I focus on MacGyver'ish things like "vice grips" and tape, and knives and glue, and well, you get the idea.

It's funny, but you get a good feeling when you can rig something up and make it work to get home on.

Wrapped the blown fuse in tin foil and that seemed to work. Then I had to take the cover off the jack control, remove the switch, get two screwdrivers and hold one each across the DOWN contacts. Voila. That worked. The UP contacts were still ok.

Seems overly complicated to me. If you carry a circuit tester, you can use the tester to bypass the fuse temporarily, without having to make anything.

What kind of jack do you have? Earlier Barkers had 2 plug in cheap internal relay switches that acted similar to your description. The Barker also had a hand crank in the event of an electrical jack failure.

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What kind of jack do you have? Earlier Barkers had 2 plug in cheap internal relay switches that acted similar to your description. The Barker also had a hand crank in the event of an electrical jack failure.

It's not a Barker, it's an ACME. Bought it last year when we got the trailer. They call it a "Heavy Duty" jack and I paid a heavy duty price. I was a bit ticked off that the SW burned out in 12 months.

Ok, yes there is a hand crank. However, to use this crank efficiently, I would have to remove the propane cover and the tanks in order to swing the crank through 360 degrees. That would be fine if I had to do it once. But not so fine to do 6 times - 3 landings and 3 takeoffs. It was fairly easy to jimmy the switch with two screwdrivers.

The manual crank handle mounts on the front of Atwood jacks, where there are no obstructions. Also, we have had no problems with ours since purchasing it about 5 years ago. However, we keep it covered with an old boat fender (bumper) to protect it from the sun, weather, dirt and road hazards.